Strange tale ties pit bull clones and sex with missionary

Bernann McKinney holds one of five cloned pit bull puppies during her first meeting with them in Seoul, South Korea, Aug. 5, (Ahn Young-joon/AP)

This is a Seattle-area crime blog, but every so often there are bizarre crime stories that are worth passing on, such as this one about the woman who cloned her dead pit bull.

News outlets are reporting that woman, Bernann McKinney, appears to be the same woman who in 1978 was accused of kidnapping a Mormon missionary, chaining him to a bed with mink handcuffs and forcing him to have sex.

McKinney paid $50,000 to have five pit bulls cloned in South Korea this week, and the pups made news as the first successful canine clones.

But she may have been known for the more scandelous story three decades ago as Joyce McKinney. Here’s more from The Salt Lake City Tribune:

Joyce McKinney made international news when she was charged with abducting a Mormon missionary, with the help of a male friend, and taking him to a cottage in England, where she forced him to have sex with her. She and the alleged victim had known each other at Brigham Young University before he left for his mission. She always maintained it was consensual sex.

Joyce McKinney made more news when she disappeared as the trial was under way and fled the country. British authorities eventually gave up trying to extradite her, but she was in trouble with the law again in Salt Lake City in the mid-1980s for allegedly stalking the alleged rape victim. She sued the Salt Lake City Police Department for false arrest and assault, but the case was eventually dismissed.

During the early and mid-1980s, Joyce McKinney often would call newspapers, including The Salt Lake Tribune, and talk to any reporter who answered the phone about her exploits, her persecution by authorities and her fan mail, including a colorful letter she received from a fraternity house at the University of Texas inviting her down to their place.

P-I news researcher Marsha Milroy, a dog lover who found this link, found public documents showing Joyce and Bernann McKinney share the same Social Security number and have the same address in North Carolina.

When contacted in South Korea by a Tribune columnist, the dog cloner denied the connection. She also denied the link to the foreign press.